Tag Archives: electronic

Tape Life Records presents Dead Red Velvet’s second release, Skeleton Shore, a six-song romp through dark techno, gritty electropop and cinematic dark ambient. The follow-up to The Ghostly Divide drops the guitars in favour of Mohr’s trademark synth work, seducing with urgent songs touching on arboreal ghosts, Austrian immigration, nuclear power and otherworldly luminosity. Culled mostly from the period 2004-2006, this is Mohr’s most tonally-consistent work. An electronic music acid bath of edge and depth, this short album is recommended for fans of 80s alternative, dark ambient, golden era industrial, Skinny Puppy and darker sides of Shriekback.

SELECTED RECORDINGS FROM 2004-2006, EXCEPT 06 FROM 2011, PUBLISHED BY MULTIBEAT MUSIC (SOCAN) AND REMASTERED FOR TAPE LIFE RECORDS IN 2019.

VOCAL SAMPLES ON 01 BY JULIA GALIOS. SOPRANO VOICE ON 05 BY KRISTIN MUELLER. COVER IMAGE IS FROM THE MUSIC VIDEO FOR 02, DIRECTED BY ELIZABETH FEARON, SHOT BY GILLIAN WILLIAMSON. PAPER MOUNTAIN DESIGNED AND BUILT BY EDMUND LAW. SLEEVE DESIGN BY SITUATSI.

Engrossed in recording material for Full Moon Film in 2006, Karl Mohr took pause to let off steam with his minimalist hardcore machine-music effort Droid Charge: punishing techno tracks manipulating timbre and tempo wildly across a palette of dance floor destruction. In 2017, Mohr reframed Droid Charge as Rex Ramsa. The original album has been renamed and re-mastered for release on Tape Life Records.

Encapsulating soulless abstract art techno, noise and hardcore dance music, this debut from Rex Ramsa is dedicated to blatant, caustic, mechanical expressions: clone non-music for a non-audience devoid of aesthetics and empathy. A volcano of dirty and ugly minimalism, Stamina Charge is not for the faint of heart. Some reactions to Stamina Charge: “Daft Punk in an angry mood on a bad day.” “Percussion carpet-bombed by the Droid Army.” “A karate chop to the throat!”

With a specific focus on driving human biorhythms into accelerated states using tempo manipulation and sonic bombardment, this fracas can induce heightened physical effects and anxiety. For fans of: hard hypnotic schranz, extreme electronic, rhythmic noise and the UK dark techno scene.

Levitate into scintillating Adriatic dreams with Chill House Voyage, a splash of invigorating electronic music. Karl Mohr’s Viennese period featured a foray into broader-appeal ambient house music: percolating late summer nights and early pool-side after party mornings are called to mind on this moody, azure delight. Blue Visions has been Mohr’s most successful music project, distilling the best aspects of European deep house and ambient dub into a brisk, refreshing uptempo cocktail. In its first incarnation as 2004’s A Journey Into Chill House, the single “Wassernixe” was featured on a Sony/Columbia compilation Vienna Vibrations 2 – The 2nd Gathering; a clear blue vinyl 12″ Wassernixe/Froze Like Ice was released by Interdimensional Industries. “House Of The Rising Void” appeared in a feature film sequel to Trainspotting called Ecstasy (2011), and many of the tracks were heard on the Canadian television series Metropia. The gorgeous remastering of Tape Life’s new re-issue of this chill house classic reveals two previously unreleased tracks. Ideal for the dance floor, cocktail party or melt-away summer vacation, the shifting tones of the chill house genre are addressed with panache by Blue Visions; two tracks incorporate beautifully the brazen torch vocals of jazz singer Chantal Thompson. For fans of Café Del Mar, José Padilla, 808 State, Todd Terry. Genres include chillout, chill house, deep house, ambient, electronic.

released Nov 18, 2018

ALL TITLES WRITTEN, PERFORMED, ENGINEERED,
EDITED, MIXED, MASTERED AND PRODUCED BY KARL MOHR.
04 WRITTEN BY KARL MOHR/CHANTAL THOMPSON.

SELECTED RECORDINGS FROM 2001
PUBLISHED BY MULTIBEAT MUSIC (SOCAN) AND
REMASTERED FOR TAPE LIFE RECORDS IN 2018.

Tape Life presents the eighth and final Karl Mohr Audio-Yo release: Standard Deviation, a dark ambient film score. Following his 1997 techno-industrial tour de force, The Heck, Mohr switched gears into songwriting as Dead Red Velvet, but not before composing this dire soundtrack to Samuel Kiehoon Lee’s independent feature, Standard Deviation. The film concerns psychic hotlines, lottery pyramid schemes and the Y2K Problem; the accompanying music is no less intriguing. Acoustic and electronic instruments blend tastefully with copious sampling – the album stands as a mature, sophisticated and textured body of work. This pivotal release echoes, in chrysalis anguish, Mohr’s early experiments and also foreshadows the bleak, downcast goth elements found in Dead Red Velvet. Recommended listening for fans of film music and dark ambient; reminds at times of Peter Gabriel’s Passion or Alexander Zlamal’s score for Heller als der Mond.

SELECTED RECORDINGS FROM 1997
PUBLISHED BY MULTIBEAT MUSIC (SOCAN) AND
REMASTERED FOR TAPE LIFE RECORDS IN 2017.

MUSIC COMPOSED FOR THE SAMUEL KIEHOON LEE FILM,STANDARD DEVIATION (1997). THE VOICE ON 04 IS SAMPLED
DIALOG FROM THE FILM AND IS USED BY PERMISSION.
SPECIAL THANKS: S. K. LEE, I. REVELL, E. MOHR, V. MARCONE.

COVER IMAGES ARE STILLS FROM THE FILM. DESIGN BY SITUATSI.
BPM VALUES ARE APPROXIMATE AND MAY DRIFT.

Tape Life presents the seventh Karl Mohr Audio-Yo album, The Heck 2017 Edition. This twentieth anniversary re-release has been meticulously remastered and features updates to the original 1997 track list. Featuring material recorded 1993-1997, the critically acclaimed The Heck was a future-forward album of Mohr’s best work; the 2017 Edition sounds fresh and relevant two decades later. Claiming “100% Electronic Thrills,” the album is mostly instrumental, with Mohr’s vocal work sparse against the mad sample collages and towering techno architecture. Equally influenced by rave culture and industrial music, this eccentric and daring milestone reissue is recommended for fans of dancefloor-oriented electronic music.

The sixth release from Karl Mohr Audio-Yo, Transgalactic, presents instrumental material from 1993-1995. It’s a wild, electronic ride spanning many genres and would foreshadow in flavour Mohr’s critically acclaimed 1997 follow-up, The Heck. The basement outtakes feel goes deep with spacey ambient, maximal house boppers and weirdo electroquirk, peaking with the brilliant techno anthem “Flowers”. Influenced by the electronic music of the time, this collection will be loved by fans of 808 State, The Orb, Terre Thaemlitz, Aphex Twin and Art Of Noise.

The fourth album from Karl Mohr Audio-Yo explodes with a technicolor splash of Nineties rave power. Skyfire Sessions is a psychedelic dance trip navigating techno, house and ambient grooves, featuring recordings from 1992-1993. His prodigious techno recording sessions were inspired by the burgeoning rave movement of the day and, in particular, the dedicated rave community rocking Kingston, Ontario. Tempted since 1987 by the lure of acid house, in 1991 Mohr turned his attentions away from electro-industrial and dark ambient to the kinetic music of blacklight visions and strobing lasers. Ten finely-milled dance floor tracks, remixes and megamixes will appeal to fans of: The Orb, Underworld, A Guy Called Gerald, The Shamen, 808 State, Juan Atkins, Kevin Saunderson, Derrick May, Aphex Twin, Orbital, Todd Terry, Simon Harris and Lil Louis.

Tape Life presents the third Karl Mohr Audio-Yo release, Strange Tides, a moody journey into ambient instrumental works recorded 1991-1995. Five pieces demonstrate a vastness of desolation in pensive electroacoustic art, conjuring images of tidal flats, pagan ritual and surgical purgatory – an opening of the floodgates to become submerged in cinematic sound. A dark ‘make out record’ for intimate moments of melancholic escape, this album is recommended for fans of dark ambient and film music.